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Children's Care Options (COFK) has built one of the nation's largest pediatric intensive networks, serving more than 28,000 children in 12 states, and is looking to almost double its geographic footprint within the next five years by leveraging its own technology stack.
The Dallas-based company recently unified 14 intrapediatric care organizations under a single national brand. Today, COFK is building a stronger pipeline of home-based pediatric care workers, expanding access to care in a “fragmented” market, and leaning on a flexible, technology-driven platform.
Home Health Care News spoke to CEO Mark Bush about how the reorganization has impacted the organization, the technological advances it has made, and how the company's culture will affect pediatric patients and their families.
The following conversations have been edited for length and clarity.
HHCN: Can you explain the purpose behind the recent rebranding and how it has impacted the organization's culture and operations?
Bush: It was transformative for us. We had to acquire 14 individual organizations and find a way to unify our culture. There were many great businesses that came together to create COFK, but everything had to be united and connected. The rebranding allowed us to engage with staff and teams, highlight shared objectives, and start linking some of our systems and best practices from an operational perspective. As we grow, having a unified brand can help us tell our story, especially in a competitive recruitment environment. It also helps in advocacy and strengthens recruitment efforts.
What are the biggest challenges faced in maintaining a professional pediatric network in multiple states? Also, how did you deal with it?
All conditions are a little different. While we aim to build a national presence, we still operate within a highly localized regulatory environment. You need to develop a scalable operating model that is flexible enough to accommodate the nuances of your local market. That's what we're trying to achieve with our infrastructure and technology stack. It also provides teams in this space with the flexibility of entrepreneurs to operate in highly fragmented markets, depending on the state.
What are your main goals for expanding or improving our services in the future?
We plan to expand to the markets we currently serve. Identifying gaps and areas missing in your current footprint is a priority. Over the past 16 months, we have opened more de novos than ever before, mainly to fill those gaps. We imagine we will reach 20-25 states over the next five years. The industry we work for makes it difficult for small providers to manage cash flow issues and regulatory challenges. Therefore, we aim to expand our presence and expand our pediatric focus to more markets where families and patients need support.
COFK has created a digital portal to help place caregivers together with clients. This is called the front door portal. How does this tool enhance clinical workflow and patient outcomes?
The portal is an important tool for engaging with field staff. Access your open needs in real time and connect the right clinician with the right patients or families. Ideally, it will help close the gap in access to care that exists.
There is currently a strong supply and demand imbalance due to the demand for care exceeding the number of available clinicians. Therefore, being able to connect dots and clinicians to the right family in real time is essential. Ultimately, increasing the filling rate and effectively using approved time is the best way to improve patient outcomes. It therefore serves as an engagement tool and also helps connect the right clinician with families in need.
How do you assess the success of integration efforts and technology solutions?
Our success and how you measure it is, we want to grow our business. Quality care usually leads to seeing thriving companies and markets, creating opportunities for teams. We measure key performance indicators and these measurements can also tell important stories in terms of what we do every day. So it's multifaceted.
What advice would you offer to other healthcare organizations looking to build a technology-driven network focused on similar patients?
We believe that is the people first. You need a group or team that is centered around the same mission. Home hygiene is difficult. For a clinician at work, it is sometimes lonely. We strive to make this easier by using systems and infrastructure to benefit patients while simplifying the work of caregivers.
What strategies are you using to build a strong internal community and to promote professional growth among team members?
We worked hard to create a culture that gathers around the mission and introduced the compass. This is worth working every day for us. It doesn't matter whether it's a bedside caregiver or a behind-the-scenes team member helping to support that effort. It was important for us to create that mission and bring together that aspect of it.
But it also concerns the career path. You want to invest in your team to improve your skills and promote professional development. We partner with institutions of higher education. We support new graduates and support clinicians entering home health for the first time and creating pathways for those careers. This is an essential way for us to distinguish COFK from others in the space and build awareness and commitment from our team to be with us.
How does this large-scale focus on pediatric care affect approaches to providing services and supporting families?
It's not a side job for us. Many large home healthcare institutions work with children, but that is often not their main focus. We lead the fact that many of the children we care about are part of the most underserved and vulnerable populations in the health care system. That is our central focus and we are constantly raising awareness.
Overall, we also promote the health of our children's hometowns as a career opportunity. Many new graduate nurses and therapists have not realized that working in a pediatric-focused home health environment is a viable option. Our pediatric focus and advocacy efforts in this work are important and we take pride in what we do.
Can an organization share how they address the specific needs of vulnerable or underserved communities?
It's part of our nature. Because Medicaid primarily funds us, we often serve underserved and vulnerable people in our communities. We often cover rural markets, bridge access gaps using technologies such as telehealth, and reach parts of our community. Finding qualified caregivers is difficult right now, so we are working to meet those needs and fill in the gaps as much as possible.
